"Don't insult my father's memory! Say what you choose of me, but don't insult my father!"
"I don't insult him; I honor him. Compared with you, he was pure and virtuous. He was free, from all affectation of morality, from lying, deceit and treachery!"
"Who is it that speaks?" said the king, interrupting her. "Is this my wife? Is it a queen who utters these words?"
"They ought not to be my words; you have forced them upon me. But let us not dispute about words. Your father bestowed his affections on a stranger who lived at a distance, and who did not know his wife. Compared with your conduct, his was virtue itself. You were false to me, and that, too, with a friend who was constantly at my side; we conversed together of love, of the stars, of the trees, the mountains and the valleys, and our thoughts seemed as one. Side by side, we beheld the works of art, we sang, we played together--and yet you could both act thus, while at my side, and enter the inner sanctuary of that which is highest in life. The sky, the earth, all that was pure and noble in thought or word--you have destroyed them all. I would like to know the day when, by word or glance, you both ventured to begin your false game! With every kiss you gave her, you must have said; 'Ah, my wife--how unhappy I am--she's so narrow-minded, so devoid of grandeur--'Don't interrupt me! Of one thing I am sure: no husband or wife can ever touch the hand of another in love, without feeling: 'I am miserable.' It isn't hatred and revenge that now speak through me, it is justice! As long as I still loved you, I could hate you; but now I simply judge you. You must bear the consequences of your actions. Justice requires that. I pity and deplore your lot. How will you ever delight in the forest, when she whom you loaded with sin fled through the forest unto death? How can you look at the lake into which her sin plunged her? The whole world is annihilated to you, you poor creature! How your pen must tremble when you again sign a death sentence--you've murdered both the dead and the living! You may write 'pardon,' but who will pardon you, 'king by the grace of God'?"
"Mathilde, I once believed you incapable of even alluding to that which is unseemly."
"Did you believe it? and what would you call unseemly in your case?"
"Speak on, speak on!" said the king, as the queen now paused and heaved a sigh. He saw the fire consuming all that was dearest to him on earth, and, at the same time, recognized the beauty of the flame. There are strange chords in the human soul, and the king, although filled with shame and indignation, could not but admire the power revealed by his wife. He had never dreamed of its existence. She was greater and stronger than he had ever imagined, and his appeal to her seemed to acknowledge her supremacy. This made her the more indignant and, with forced composure, she continued:
"No one has a right to demand of another, of a prince, or even of yourself, that he should be a genius; but every one has a right to ask that you should be an upright man, a true husband and father. You could be that, just as easily as any peasant or day-laborer can."
Pain and resentment were depicted in the king's countenance.
"Mathilde," said he, at last, in a tremulous voice, "Mathilde, I am not speaking of myself; but consider how these words must injure you."